Newspaper Clippings

CCAHA Conservator
Rebecca Smyrl with folded
newspaper clipping.

Nowadays we simply link to a newspaper article in an e-mail.  All you have to do is click.

But back in the old days, things were a little more complicated.  If you wanted to share a newspaper article with a friend or relative living far away, you might purchase an additional newspaper, cut out the article, fold it down to envelope size, and enclose it with a personal letter.

When rooting through old letters preserved in their original envelopes, you never know what you may find.  In our family collection, I’ve run across buttons, tickets, photographs, and clipped articles, all stashed in their original envelopes.

Rebecca Smyrl, Conservator at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts, recommends extreme caution with the initial examination of a folded newspaper clipping.  “The paper degrades faster at the folds,”

she warns.  “Only unfold the clipping if you’re

Folded newsprint that had been
enclosed in an envelope from
the 1960s.

confident that the paper will hold together – without breaking at the folds.”

Once the letter is unfolded, it’s best to leave it flat rather than attempting to refold it.  “Ideally, these pieces should be stored flat in non-acidic folders and boxes,” Rebecca notes.  “The creases will flatten over time.”  While the creased areas will always remain weaker than the rest of the paper, their deterioration will be slowed.  (See the earlier blog entry “Preservation Tips for Letters” for more information on flattening paper.)

Rebecca’s recommendations for storage are the same as for the newspaper preservation discussed in last week’s blog entry “Closets and Other Storage Options.”  But this raises another problem…  This storage option separates the clipping from its original context – the envelope and the letter.  As a solution, Rebecca suggests making some sort of record of the clipping (a copy or a detailed note) to store with the original letter and envelope.  Just don’t use post-it notes, she cautions.  Keep those adhesives far away from your historic documents!

© 2011 Lee Price

Closets and Other Storage Options

According to Rebecca Smyrl, Conservator at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts, I could have done far worse than storing our family collection newspapers in our home office closet.  The newspapers in question are 25-year-old Wayfarers, a Bucks County tourist newspaper that I published (with much help from my father) from 1985 to 1988.  I still have around 200 of these newspapers and they have great sentimental value.

As opposed to garages and basements, a closet on the second floor of the house isn’t really that bad of a storage environment.  Safely ensconced in the closet, the newspapers receive very little light exposure and additionally benefit from being in the main part of the house where temperatures are relatively stable and humidity under control.  Therefore, thanks to my enlightened strategy of benign neglect, the newspapers have remained in

                                                                          fairly good condition.

Inevitably the newspapers will deteriorate over time.  Their highly acidic paper will eventually result in their becoming very brittle, flaking at the touch.  Affordable preservation strategies can considerably slow this process but cannot reverse the basic chemistry.

For long-term storage, Rebecca recommends interleaving the pages of each newspaper with acid-free paper and then storing the newspapers flat in acid-free folders and boxes.  University Products, a respected vendor of archival supplies, offers “buffered acid-free interleaving tissue paper,” which should be perfect for the job.  For my one-stop shopping needs, University Products also offers newspaper storage folders and black newspaper boxes.

To reduce long-term wear caused by handling of the newspapers, Rebecca suggests digitizing at least some of them.  Digitization would create a record of the newspaper content in another medium, offering one more level of preservation and accessibility in the hopes that there will be Wayfarers for future generations to enjoy in the

22nd century and beyond.

© 2011 Lee Price

The Condition of the Newspapers

CCAHA Conservator Rebecca Smyrl examines
a newspaper from the family collection.

I published a biweekly tourist newspaper, The Wayfarer of Central Bucks County, from 1985 to 1988.  As part of our family collection, my stacks of Wayfarers are especially meaningful to me because of my father’s involvement with the paper.  He conceived the character of the Wayfarer and drew dozens of cartoons of him in various comic situations.  Also, he helped me sell ads and deliver the paper to over a hundred locations in New Hope, Doylestown, and Newtown, Pennsylvania.

For delivery, I had a flatbed pickup truck with no cover.  The morning after the paper was printed, I’d drive out to Gloucester City, New Jersey, to pick up the paper bundles – each composed of 50 to 100 newspapers wrapped together by twine.  We tossed these bundles into the back of the truck where they were entirely exposed to sunlight, heat, and wind.

Wayfarer cartoon by
Art Price.

By its nature, newsprint is ephemeral.  It’s not built to last.  Newspapers are made to be read today and tossed out tomorrow.  They’re printed on cheap paper and don’t even merit a cover to protect their contents.

Twenty-five years later, I bring some sample Wayfarers to the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts for an examination by Rebecca Smyrl, Conservator at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts.  She immediately notices the varying amounts of light damage.  There’s a simple explanation for that.  The paper on the top of each bundle received maximum light exposure.  Papers buried deep within a bundle received practically none.  Therefore some of the papers have turned a sickly yellow from sitting out in the sunlight while others have retained their original tan/ivory tone.

Rebecca explains to me that the light exposure not only changes the color but accelerates the process of the paper becoming more brittle.  She checks one of the particularly exposed corners and reports that the paper is still in surprisingly good condition, retaining a fair amount of flexibility.  Doubtless, their preservation has been helped by their storage.  After those first few days of intense environmental exposure, the papers have spent most of the years neglected in a closet on the second floor of the house – in darkness with stable temperature and humidity.

Rebecca’s other major concern is with rips and tears on the papers.  Some of these may date back to the original rope ties that held the bundles together and others may be from handling.  Once a tear begins, further handling can easily make it worse.  A conservator can repair newsprint mends very effectively with long fiber paper and wheat starch paste.  But, Rebecca warns, this is a job for a professional.  Conservators see way too many home repair jobs, usually done with acidic tapes that invariably cause serious long-term damage.

Previous Preserving a Family Collection entries have stressed this before but it bears repeating:  Never use scotch tape or other commonly available adhesives to repair items in your family collection.  Just don’t do it.

© 2011 Lee Price

Whether to Wear Gloves

In the cliché image (to the extent that there is an image at all), a conservator might look like a doctor, with lab coat and white gloves, poised with a scalpel or brush over a priceless painting or manuscript.   The gloves are a standard issue part of the cliché.  After all, if you go to an archive and request to see a rare item, you will probably be asked to don the gloves.  Therefore, it seems like it must be a general rule about handling artifacts:  always wear gloves.

But if you ever take a tour of the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts, you will see conservators working on amazing historical documents and artworks – Audubon prints and illuminated manuscripts and Jefferson letters – and they’ll mainly be working without gloves.  Most visitors are surprised to see this.

Paper is always at-risk when human hands are present.  Hands are notorious dirt magnets.  Seemingly tiny amounts of dirt and grime quickly build up on paper surfaces over a series of handlings.  Just look at any popular old book for the dirty thumb spot where a finger naturally falls when opening the book.  And hands are oily, too, and these oils can migrate deeply into the paper, causing long-term damage.

Indeed, wearing gloves is not a bad idea at all!  They are an excellent defense against dirt and oil.  Archives should ask you to don the pair of gloves before handling requested items.

But gloves have their downside as well.  In particular, they decrease dexterity.  A conservator’s work depends on delicate precision handwork and that simply can’t be achieved when working through a cotton barrier.  Conservators need to feel the paper they are working with.

Over the next two weeks, I will be working with Rebecca Smyrl, Conservator at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts, as we discuss preservation strategies for the newspapers, magazines, and other periodicals in our family collection.  Rebecca doesn’t think it’s necessary for me to invest in the white gloves to handle these particular items:  “When turning the pages of old newspapers or magazines, even thin cotton gloves can catch and tear the paper.   It’s probably enough to simply wash your hands thoroughly before handling to get the oils off your hands.

“Also,” Rebecca adds, “on the subject of hand washing, I think that many people may apply lotion or moisturizer after washing, but they should skip this step before handling any archival materials.”

© 2011 Lee Price

Newspapers and Magazines

It’s not unusual to run across old newspapers and magazines while inventorying a family collection.  People save periodicals for many reasons.  Sometimes it’s obvious why the paper was saved, say in the instance of a moon landing or Kennedy assassination headline.  Sometimes it’s a full set of a favorite magazine.  But in other cases, the reason why the magazine or newspaper was saved may remain obscure, perhaps ultimately unknowable.

We have very few magazines in our family collection, but we do have some pamphlets and other ephemeral publications that we hope to preserve.  Preservation of a playbill from 1950 isn’t really too different from preservation of an old Life magazine.  They’re both leaves of glossy paper, saddle stitched together.

My main concern is with newspapers.  I’ve got piles of them.  From 1985 to 1988, I published a free tourist newspaper called The Wayfarer of Central Bucks County.  It was published biweekly and served the New Hope, Lahaska, Doylestown, and Newtown area of Bucks County, Pennsylvania.  Adding to the sentimental value of the paper, my father drew dozens of cartoons for it.  Now by its nature, newprint is cheap paper.  There’s no question that these newspapers are deteriorating.  But, if only for sentimental reasons, I also feel that it’s worth making an effort to save them.

A confession:  Fifteen years ago, my wife gave me a gift of acid-free paper and boxes to use to preserve the Wayfarers.  Much as I loved the gift, I never got around to actually doing the project.  Instead the papers have been languishing in a dark closet.

Over the next two weeks, I’ll be discussing the preservation of periodicals with Rebecca Smyrl, Conservator at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts.  Like my wife, she disapproves of my neglect of the newspapers.  Sorry!  I’ll try to do better.

© 2011 Lee Price

The Stylish Blogger Award

Technically, this award belongs to “June and Art” but since the award is for Blogger and not Blog, I think I'll share it here, too.  Additionally, this provides a nice intro to a new series on preservation of newspapers and magazines.  Today's illustrations are all from newsprint in the family collection.

(Cross-posted on June and Art…)  Caftan Woman, who writes a lovely blog about classic films, has been a friend and supporter of “June and Art” since the very first week.  A few days ago, I was surprised, thrilled, and humbled to receive a “Stylish Blogger Award” from her.

Purely intended for fun and promotion, the “Stylish Blogger Award” offers an opportunity for bloggers to honor their fellow blog stylists.  After all, blogging is hard, lonely work… and it’s particularly challenging if one is expected to maintain a high standard of “style.”  At the very least, we workers in a virtual medium deserve an occasional virtual award.

And now for the award obligations…  As a recipient, I have been requested to post seven facts about myself and then present the award to seven of my favorite stylish bloggers (yes, it is something like a chain letter, but infinitely cooler).

7 RANDOM OBSERVATIONS ABOUT ME

1.  I had a wonderful childhood.  It was great growing up with my sister Jamie, my cousins Teddy, Debbie, Carol, and Tommy (Anderson), Mark, Ricky, and Billy (Scholl), my Uncle Ted and Aunt Diane, my Uncle Bob and Aunt Dot, my grandparents, and, of course, my parents (June and Art).  You couldn’t ask for a better family.

2.  I loved dinosaurs as a child (okay, still do!).  My father painted a large mural on our basement wall of a prehistoric world replete with dinosaurs.  I’ve searched through all our old photos but haven’t found a single one that captures even a part of the wall.  Our basement was a magical place, now only retained in memory.

3.  Today's blog entry is illustrated by Wayfarer cartoons drawn by my father from 1985 to 1988.  During those years, I published a tourist newspaper called The Wayfarer of Central Bucks County (that’s the New Hope area of Pennsylvania).  My father had recently retired and became thoroughly involved in the business.  He created the central image of the Wayfarer for the newspaper, drew dozens of cartoons over a 3 ½ year period, helped deliver each issue of the biweekly paper to over a hundred locations, and sold ads.  Many people in the area came to think of him as the Wayfarer.

4.  I’m a long-time fan of classic film.  My dozen favorite movies of 1949 (the year June and Art met) are:  The Third Man with Orson Welles and Joseph Cotten, High Diving Hare (my favorite Bugs Bunny cartoon), The Heiress with Olivia de Havilland, Late Spring by Japanese master director Yasujiro Ozu, Intruder in the Dust from the novel by William Faulkner, Mighty Joe Young with special effects by animation wizards Willis O’Brien and Ray Harryhausen, The Window with tragic child star Bobby Driscoll, The Set-Up with Robert Ryan and Audrey Totter, Kind Hearts and Coronets with Alec Guinness in multiple roles, Fast and Furry-ous (the first Roadrunner/Wile E. Coyote cartoon!), Adam’s Rib with Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, and A Letter to Three Wives who were played by Jeanne Crain, Ann Sothern, and Linda Darnell.  My mother’s favorite film from 1949 was Whiskey Galore (then known on its American release as Tight Little Island – it was one of the first of the new wave of distinctive comedies from England, many of which would star Alec Guinness).

5.  I grew up attending the Southampton United Methodist Church.  When I met Lisa after college, we began attending Mennonite services together and were eventually married in the Mennonite Church.  Now we live in New Jersey and there isn’t a convenient Mennonite meetinghouse nearby, so we’ve been Methodists for the past 15+ years.  We consider ourselves Mennonite-attending-Methodist and our core convictions remain Mennonite (very liberal Mennonite, that is).

6.  We often visited historic sites and reconstructed villages like Williamsburg when I was growing up.  I work in the field of history now.  My wife’s hobby is historic hearth cooking.  When we were looking for a house to buy, her only demand was that it have a fireplace large enough to cook in.

7.  I worked at Art’s Market, my father’s grocery store, from 1973 through 1985.  Many of our regular customers were low-income, seasonal workers.  We had a metal box under the front counter where we kept track of their credit on filing cards.  Payment was on an honor system.  Over the years, we lost a lot of money through this old-fashioned system – but no one went hungry.

THE ENVELOPES PLEASE…

While the coveted “Stylish Blogger Award” appears to have its roots in movie blogs, my interests are fairly broad as reflected by my choices:

Kissssing

Porter Hovey manages this unique love blog.  It’s the only competition that “June and Art” has for the title “most romantic blog on the internet.”

If I Ran the Zoo

I’ve praised Tom Hilton’s real-time history blog Up and Down California before, so this time I’ll happily drop a plug for Tom’s joyous Sierrablogging and Wildflowerblogging on “If I Ran the Zoo.”  He handles the microcosmic details of flowers and the macrocosmic beauty of landscapes with unfailing style.

Basket of Kisses

It may take place in the same city as “June and Art” and in only a slightly later time period, but the Mad Men series celebrated in this blog exists in a wholly different universe.  Fortunately, New York City is big enough to accommodate both.  Always best wishes to the ultra-stylish Deborah Lipp and her sister Roberta!

Diary of a Mad Movie Fanatic

Robert Gelpi is one of my old IMDb Classic Film buddies where he went by the moniker Hal900 (and a fellow essayist in the book Horror 101 where I wrote about Der Golem and Jurassic Park and Robert examined The Stepford Wives).  Nowadays, he’s got this fine and stylish blog where he incisively reviews old movies and new.   He’s got a great eye for a screen capture, too!

The Uncataloged Museum

Whether leading the delightful Ukrainian Pickle Project or discussing the dung exhibit at the National Zoo in Washington, blogger Linda Norris is unfailingly entertaining, witty, and stylish.  As a fellow fundraiser and museum lover, I tip my hat to her charming and informative blog.

“Know Your Own Bone…”

Colleen Dilenschneider is my social media guru.  Museums and other nonprofits are rapidly changing in this new electronic world, and I am extremely dependent upon Colleen as my tour guide in this bewildering environment.  I think she has style in abundance.

Easily Distracted

I discovered Timothy Burke’s blog through his upbeat endorsement of College of the Atlantic (where my son will begin his freshman year this September).  I stuck around because his blog entries are consistently intelligent and thought-provoking.

So there they are:  Seven stylish bloggers deserving of awards and applause.

All of today's illustrations are by Art Price.

© 2011 Lee Price